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Published 13th June 2003

Vol 44 No 12


Zimbabwe

Both sides lose

A week of strikes shows that the opposition lacks a plan and that President Robert Mugabe needs brute force to survive

Let him take his medicine!' South Africa's Foreign Minister Nkosazana Zuma told fellow diplomats after learning that opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai had been detained after a week of strikes against President Robert Mugabe's government. Zuma fumed that Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change had pushed back prospects for serious negotiations with the Mugabe government by launching its mass action last week. Zuma is a close confidante of South African President Thabo Mbeki and her outburst shows how little sympathy Pretoria has with either Tsvangirai or the MDC.


Kazini goes back to school

Image courtesy of Panos Pictures

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The sacking of a top general has nothing to do with allegations of his corruption, say the military

Commander of the Ugandan People's Defence Force Major General James Kazini was second only to President Yoweri Museveni in the military hierarchy. So continuing allegations of corr...


Finally, an election

General Kagame is set to win easily against a divided opposition in this year's election

The democracy bandwagon Rwandan style rolls on. President Paul Kagame is determined to win a multi-party election on his own terms and will probably do it. He has rejected the no-p...


Who loses under Guebuza

Helder Muteia: the Minister of Agriculture. A Young Turk reformer, he naively accepted the mantle of the Chissano camp in the leadership contest where Guebuza decisively beat him. ...


Sacking the veep

Frayed tempers and shoddy deals lie behind President Mwanawasa's political cull

In an unexpected reshuffle on 28 May, President Levy Mwanawasa sacked Vice-President Enock Kavindele, long-time friend and Finance Minister Emmanuel Kasonde and Information Ministe...


Guebuza blues

The prospect of a new president is forcing Frelimo's divisions to the surface

With the December 2004 elections now in sight and President Joaquim Chissano stepping down after 18 years in power, the long-running battle for power in the ruling Frente de Libert...



Pointers

Where next?

The Sierra Leone Special Court's indictment of President Charles Taylor leaves him little option but to fight to the death, potentially taking the thousands of Liberians who have c...


Leaky and unlucky

Revelations by Royal Dutch/Shell that thefts of crude oil from its operations in the Niger Delta could amount to as much as 100,000 barrels a day have been followed by threats of a...


Sticking points

I will not be absorbed for the second time in my life!' John Garang told parliamentarians and aid workers in Britain's Portcullis House on 3 June. The Sudan People's Liberation Arm...


Battle for Bunia

Quarrelling over posts in a power-sharing government, pitting Kinshasa's proxies against those of Rwanda, reflects a similar struggle in eastern Congo where Kinshasa and Rwanda bac...